All future polls to be held with voting machines with paper trails, says Election commission

The Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) system records the candidate and symbol a person voted for but the voter cannot take the receipt home

By: News Desk |
May 12, 2017 6:47 pm

The Election Commission of India has said that it will hold all future elections using Electronic Voting machines with VVPAT (or voter-verifiable paper audit trail). The crucial announcement comes after the poll panel held an all party meet in the national capital amid allegations of tampering and rigging of EVMs in recent Assembly and municipal polls. The Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) system records the candidate and symbol a person voted for but the voter cannot take the receipt home.

Speaking with reporters chief election commissioner Nasim Zaidi said,”All future election will be held on VVPAT”

Rubbissing allegations of tampering, Zaidi also said that parties suspecting EVM tampering would be given opportunities to prove their allegations. “We will offer opportunity to parties to demonstrate EVMs in recent elections were tampered or EVMs can be tampered even with laid down safeguards.” Recently, the Aam Aadmi Party used a dummy EVM to demonstrate how votes could be manipulated.

Will offer opportunity to parties to demonstrate EVMs in recnt elections wr tampered or EVMs cn be tampered evn with laid dwn safeguards-CEC pic.twitter.com/zcEQvA9fOY

— ANI (@ANI_news) May 12, 2017

AAP has been at the forefront of the EVM debate as the Delhi-based party continues to allege that EVMs were rigged in favour of Bharatiya Janata Party in recent elections. Opposition parties like the Congress, Bahujan Samaj Party, CPI(M) had also alleged that EVMs are vulnerable. However, poll panel denied the allegations challenging the suspecting parties to substantiate their allegations.